The throughput of communications between computing devices continues to increase as modern networking hardware enables physically separate computing devices to communicate with one another orders of magnitude faster than was previously possible. Furthermore, high-speed network communication capabilities are being made available to a greater number of people, both in the locations where people work, and in their homes. As a result, an increasing amount of data and services can be meaningfully provided to an increasing audience via such network communications. The utility of computing devices, therefore, increasingly lies in their ability to communicate with one another.
In particular, it has become more practical to perform digital data processing at a location remote from the location where such data is initially generated, and where the processed data will be consumed. For example, a user can upload a digital photograph to a server and then cause the server to process the digital photograph, changing its colors and applying other visual edits to it. In such an example, the digital processing, such as of the photograph, is being performed by a device that is remote from the user. In another, more common, example, users utilize services and functionality that are conceptually simple, such as search services, but which, in fact, require vast amounts of processing capability.
To provide such data and processing capabilities, via network communications, from a centralized location, the centralized location typically comprises hundreds or thousands of computing devices, typically mounted in vertically oriented racks. Such a collection of computing devices, as well as the associated hardware necessary to support such computing devices, and the physical structure that houses the computing devices and associated hardware, is traditionally referred to as a “data center”. With the increasing availability of high-speed network communication capabilities, and thus the increasing provision of data and services from centralized locations, as well as the traditional utilization of data centers, such as the provision of advanced computing services and massive amounts of computing processing capability, the size and quantity of datacenters continues to increase.
However, data centers often consume large quantities of electrical power, especially by the computing devices themselves. Typically, such electrical power is sourced from electrical utility grids and other municipal providers of electrical power. Such electrical power is typically received in the form of alternating current electrical energy and must be both converted to direct current electrical energy and reduced in voltage in order to be directly utilized by the processing units and other circuitry of the computing devices. Such conversions introduce inefficiencies, both in the sub-optimal utilization of purchased electrical power, and in the need to purchase, maintain and support the devices performing such conversions.
A fuel cell can consume a fuel, typically natural gas, and can natively output direct current electrical energy at a potential that can be directly utilized by the processing units and other circuitry of computing devices, such as computing devices in a data center. However, due to the nature of the process by which a fuel cell converts fuel into electrical energy, fuel cells cannot quickly modify the amount of electrical power that they produce. Thus, for example, if a fuel cell was utilized to power one or more server computing devices, and there was a need for the server computing devices to suddenly increase their processing, the fuel cell would not be able to immediately source the increased electrical current now requested by the server computing devices and, consequently, the voltage of the electrical power being output by the fuel cell would droop, thereby causing the computing devices to shutdown, unless alternative sources of electrical power were available. Similarly, if the server computing devices were to suddenly decrease their processing, the fuel cell would not be able to reduce its electrical power output sufficiently quickly, and the decreased electrical current now being requested by the server computing devices would cause the voltage of the electrical power being output by the fuel cell to surge, thereby potentially damaging the computing devices.
Prior utilizations of fuel cell technology to power computing devices have relied upon supplemental sources of electrical power, such as battery backups, to either absorb excess power produced by the fuel cell during times of decreasing power consumption by the computing devices to which such power is being provided, or to source the additional power, which cannot otherwise be provided by the fuel cell due to the limitations described above, which is required by computing devices during times of increasing power consumption. But such battery backups introduce their own costs, inefficiencies and maintenance issues.
Other solutions have attempted to predict computing device processing and, consequently, power consumption, so that a fuel cell could be given advanced notice, thereby providing it with a sufficient amount of time to either increase or decrease its production of electrical power, as appropriate. However, while processing demand can have cyclical aspects to it, it can also often be based on unexpected events. For example, computing devices providing search functionality can be accessed more frequently during business hours than during other times of the day. Consequently, the processing performed by such computing devices and, in turn, their power consumption, can predictably increase during such business hours. But such computing devices can also experience increased access during unexpected events such as, for example, the death of a celebrity. Because such instances are, by definition, unpredictable, no advance notice could have been provided to a fuel cell and, consequently, one or more computing devices powered by such a fuel cell would, again, have to resort to alternative sources of electrical power such as, for example, battery backups.